Forget Your Past

Buzludzha, Bulgaria

Meanwhile… in Bulgaria

.. Over the years I’ve visited my fair share of abandoned buildings.  They’ve always held a very strong attraction for me.  Somehow, their silent decaying facades offer the perfect blank canvas for an introverted imagination like mine… literally allowing me to conjure up vivid images of the past in my present.  Unfortunately, I fear that this may be the best opportunity I have to experience the reality of time travel in my life time, something that I’ve fantasised about incessantly since I was a small child.

It has to be said, that when I was younger there were a hell of a lot more interesting derelict buildings around.  These days, in my country at least, it’s very unfashionable to let a significant building die gracefully.  Aside from the money-making implications, we tend to feel that we are somehow disrespecting our heritage by allowing them to decay, and so, often we attempt to stop the march of time by tidying them up and imprisoning them behind a red rope, preserving them in a most awkward state of disrepair for future generations to line up and look at from a viewing platform.  The ironic thing is that abandoned buildings feel alive to me.  They are involved in a beautiful natural process that the act of preservation will, by its nature, halt and kill.

Of course my opinion is an unfairly idealised and overly romantic one.  The argument for preserving old buildings is a very strong one that I wholeheartedly support myself.  However.  On the rare occasions that I get to visit a forgotten building as magnificent as this one, I can’t help day dreaming about some of the incredible monumental relics I know back home and quietly wishing that a few more of them had been left to grow old and perish naturally rather than being unceremoniously hooked up to the proverbial life support machine of modern tourism as is so often the case these days.

Our first view of Buzludzha in the snow storm

I first heard about the Buzludzha monument (pronounced Buz’ol’ja) last summer when I was attending a photo festival in Bulgaria.  Alongside me judging a photography competition was Alexander Ivanov, a Bulgarian photographer who had gained national notoriety after spending the last 10 years shooting ‘Bulgaria from the Air’.  Back then he showed me some pictures of what looked to me like a cross between a flying saucer and Doctor Evil’s hideout perched atop a glorious mountain range.

I knew instantly that I had to go there and see it for myself.

Sure enough, 6 months later amidst the worst winter weather the country had experienced for many years, I was back in Bulgaria, and with the help of my friend Kaloyan Petrov we drove the 250km from Sofia to the edge of the Balkan Mountain range in which this magnificent building is located.

Every day we had a gruelling trek through deep snow to reach the monument.  Photo: Kaloyan Petrov

Buzludha is Bulgaria’s largest ideological monument to Communism. Designed by architect Guéorguy Stoilov, more than 6000 workers were involved in its 7 year construction including 20 leading Bulgarian artists who worked for 18 months on the interior decoration. A small, compulsory donation from every citizen in the country formed a large portion of the funds required to build this impressive structure that was finally unveiled in 1981 on what was the 1300^th anniversary of the foundation of the Bulgarian state.
Buried in the monument’s concrete structure, is a time capsule containing a message for future generations explaining the significance of the building.

… The monument during it’s glory days

The decor was a sumptuous mixture of marble and glass including a magnificent main hall containing 500sq metres of mosaic fresco depicting Bulgarian and Soviet communist themes.

The impressive former main auditorium

Mosaic frescoes around the gallery area

In 1989, Bulgaria’s bloodless revolution ended with the disbandment of the Bulgarian Communist Party.  Ownership of the monument was ceded to the state and consequently it was left to ruin.
Today, this incredible derelict building stands as an iconic monument to an abandoned ideology.

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A terrible snow storm surrounded the monument for the first 4 days we spent on the mountain.  During our daily visits to the site, I did not once get to see this fantastic structure from a distance. Striding towards it through deep powder, it would only emerge from the dense white fog just a matter of metres away.

Finally, on the 5th day of our stay the weather began to change.

As the weather started to clear up, the monument began to reveal itself

It was always my plan to try and fly a microlight over the Balkan mountains to try and get a shot of Buzludzha from the air.  Unfortunately, after waiting all week for the storm to clear, it didn’t look promising for a flight especially since my pilot had to depart imminently in order to travel to the other side of the country where he was beginning a new 6 month contract doing geological surveys.  However, on his last day before leaving we decided to risk it even though the weather was still unpredictable.  He forecast a 50/50 chance of seeing anything.

Above the clouds at -25°C

On the first attempt, we were forced to ascend to 1500ft to avoid the cloud cover over the mountains. (Flying through clouds in a microlight is not a good idea).  We were up in the air for a good hour but came back with nothing more than some pretty shots of the tops of the clouds.  My focusing finger went completely numb after just 10 minutes of flying even with my gloves on.

On the ground, we waited another few hours but the cloud didn’t budge.  I was gutted.  Then, at the eleventh hour, I pleaded with the pilot to take me back up and this time we decided to fly in low under the cloud.  Needless to say, it was a quick flight… there and back in half and hour with 2 dangerously windy circumnavigations of the monument… probably the scariest 30 minutes of my recent life.  Between the frost bitten fingers and frozen eyelids, I just about managed to get some snaps.

Making our approach to the ridge under cloud level

The monument’s impressive dome was originally covered with thirty tones of copper.

… and the two 12m tall stars either side of the top of it’s 70m tower were adorned with ruby coloured glass. Fabricated in Russia, these stars were three times larger than their counterparts at the Kremlin.

.  .  .

All week, thus far this mountain top had been an eerie and mysterious place for me, but since the snow had started to clear from the air it had really begun to open up and reveal itself along with the true majesty of its location.

When the cloud finally cleared, the view was spectacular

By sunset I was back on the ground and for the first time since we arrived I got to appreciate the full magnificence of Mount Buzludzha.  This is a site of deep historical importance for Bulgaria’s socialist movement for it was on this spot in 1891 that a secret assembly led to the formation of the movement who’s influence spanned nearly­ 100 year’s of the country’s modern history.

The next morning I got up promptly at first light and trekked up to the monument in the most glorious dawn weather possible.  It was as if I had been transported to a completely different place.  So calm and serene.

Either side of the entrance are Socialist slogans written in large concrete Cyrillic letters

Above the entrance the words ‘Forget your past’ have been daubed in red paint.

Once inside, the deep snow took a bit of navigating…

Looking up one of the staircases into the main auditorium..

Many of the original mosaics remain intact…

… others have disappeared with the souvenir hunters

The old gallery area still maintains its phenomenal views of the Balkan mountain range

… such a magnificent spot for this beautiful building…

Buzludzha… If Blofeld was a real person… he would definitely live here

.  .  .

In September 2011, the Bulgarian cabinet transferred ownership of the monument to the Bulgarian Socialist party.
Bulgaria’s Prime Minister Boyko Borisov declared, “We shall let them take care of it because here it also holds true that a party which does not respect its past and its symbols has no future”.
They have still not come to an agreement about what to do with it.
To date, every year at the end of July, 30-40,000 Bulgarian Socialists still congregate at Buzludzha to mark the founding of the Bulgarian Social-Democratic Party.

.  .  .

Want to visit Buzludzha for yourself?  HERE is the location on google earth.

One for the Students...

On August 24, 2010, in Career, Life in General, by Bob Borson 

 

I am going to start off right in the beginning and say that I am only talking about people in the design profession. While some of what I think definitely holds true for everyone, I think I could effectively argue either side of this question. To get straight to the answer, in short … I don’t care.
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People go to college to learn how to learn and to train their brain to assess problems and determine what possible steps could or should be taken. You go to a technical college to learn how to do a thing or perform a specific job. You want to learn how to work on HVAC equipment – there’s a school for that and we need  people to do those jobs – they are important, but it’s not the same set of criteria used to measure the success of of college graduate from a typical four year program (or five year program in my case … okay, technically it took me six years but is this the time and place to be talking about that?).
What I am really talking about is critical thinking – a skill that requires good logic skills but demands that the thinker employ accuracy, relevance, clarity and significance. I know what you are thinking (I don’t) …

You: Significance, really? You design thingy’s, just how highly do you think of yourself?

Regardless of what I design, however small, there are reasons for the moves I make. It’s not to often that my motivation is solely based on thinking something would look cool. There is an ebb and flow to design, a push here requires a pull there – there is a never-ending series of compromises that get made to achieve a finished product. Some of those compromises aren’t even made by me and are therefore completely out of my control. That’s why doing what I do required critical thinking – it is not a craft. As a result, I don’t count on the graduates that come to me looking for a job to be ready to enter the working world. I can’t get the most valuable piece of information I want off someone’s resume. I can look at it an infer if they are intelligent and that’s what might get them in the door. What I am interested in are finding smart and articulate communicators who have a passion for something. If you are smart, you’ll figure the rest out while learning how to make it your own. That last bit is the most important part because it implies ownership in the work which I can then infer that you will have pride in the final product, you will want it to be good for yourself rather than simply being able to check the done box on the to-do list and everyone knows that we are own harshest critics.
I always wonder what people expect from the recent college graduates they hire. Transitioning between college life and the workforce is a huge process and who among us is great at anything the first time you try it? Performing well in a new job also isn’t just about being able to do work; it’s about working with others and the challenges that group dynamics always present. It’s also about learning how to conduct yourself with integrity and professionalism – you should also consider that these recent grads have to discover the value of learning for the sake of learning. Prior to graduation their lives were based on achieving some sort of resolution to every project – there was a summation line to everything they did. The process of learning how to delegate authority and accept responsibility for things out of their control is a painful one and I expect to help steward people through this transformation – sort of a professional pay-it-forward process.
We do things a particular way in our office and there are particular things that I want done a specific way. I will take the time to teach you those things but the rest … that’s up to you and your big brain. (line forms to the left please). For what it’s worth here are some considerations or tips, whatever, that I think grads entering the workforce should know:

• You don’t know as much as you think and we both know it. Don’t pretend to know something you don’t.
• College Grads get entry level jobs and tasks. It is what it is, you aren’t the Big Man on Campus anymore.
• College hasn’t prepared you for everything; accept it and be flexible.
• Are you looking for a job or a true calling?
• Be prepared to discover what personal accountability really means; there are no do-overs, extensions or free-passes for “next time”.
• Work on your ability to communicate and actively listen
• See your task through to completion. In other words – finish what you start.

These don’t sound too hard do they? They aren’t but they don’t come naturally and most graduates haven’t been asked to be accountable to someone other than themselves at this level before. When I step back and evaluate a new hire or a recent graduate, my criteria is almost always based on their ability to learn new things and their capacity to process information. College is a period of evolution and transition for most people and despite how hard you work or how hard you party, the grades you receive in your English 101 class will never enter my radar screen. I suppose there is something to be said for the student who does study hard and makes really great grades – this speaks to preparation and responsibility which are also desirable traits in a college grad. I am probably speaking from personal experience in that I blossomed late and if you took a look at the grades I got when I was “transitioning” in school, as a possible future employer, you would have missed out on what I feel would have been your best employee. I get to work early, I leave late, I am a self-starter, and like to think I am extremely articulate and I am a good communicator. Uhmm… what school did I attend to hone those skills?  That’s right – the School of Life (Ooooooh … I got that line in my post!).
If you are a design professional, you will also know that the different college programs out there have different areas of focus to them. For example, I went to The University of Texas at Austin, where admittance is extremely competitive and it is a demanding and difficult program. They didn’t try and teach us all the things that we would need to know when we graduated – in fact, it’s almost like they went out of their way to avoid that sort of thing. The curriculum they focused on covered the areas that I wouldn’t be exposed to once I graduated. They rightfully made the conclusion that if I was smart enough to get into their program, I could figure out the technical aspects of the finer points of building detailing … and they were right.
Going to College, and therefore graduating from college, isn’t about teaching people how to solve a particular problem or perform a certain task. Going to college is about learning how to learn so you can hopefully solve new problems.
Today’s topic was brought to you as part of a series of “blog off” participants where several people are given a topic/ title and they all write on that topic.  It is a fun exercise given the loose parameters that are established.

Cheers.

Arab Alleyways

Just something I noticed on my way to work.

Dying arts...

Building through the ages...Bahrain

For architects, Bahrain offers a truly unique experience.

Here you can see the works of the most famous architects in the world, projects where only the sky has been the limit and not the thickness of the clients wallet.

What makes Bahrain unique for me is the people, who unlike most other parts of The Gulf are extremely warm, welcoming you into their homes and allowing you to take in aspects of life in the middle east you would not otherwise have experienced.

LOCAL ARCHITECTURE

While sitting inside an air-conditioned motor vehicle driving along the wide boulevards running between the turquoise Arabian Gulf and the modern skyscrapers of the Diplomatic Area in Manama city it is very difficult to imagine how different the townscapes of the main cities in the gulf were just a couple of decades ago - before the oil price rise of the seventies.

Due to Bahrain's long history, local architecture has had many influences, especially from India and Portugal which makes is somewhat different from other gulf countries.

A typical Arabic home in ancient times was built with the need for privacy in mind and aspect of building that has carried over into modern homes as well. Everyday life had to be concealed from the prying eyes of the neighbours and passerby.

However the hot weather in turn meant that much of the work had to be done outside- this led to the erecting of high walls surrounding the house, and eventually the courtyard inside the house.

Equally interesting is how the house were built. Before the industrial age people usually used materials that were readily available. In Bahrain where the sea is always close it was only natural to use coral blocks that were then set in gypsum mortar. A stable block from these primitive bricks had to be at least three blocks- or approximately 60cm- wide to ensure good insulation. These thick walls helped keep the heat outside.

Palm trees provided the materials for the beams and the roofs and just like in any other hot country all the buildings were white to reflect the warm sunshine. The windows were kept small, not only because of the need for privacy, but also to keep as much as possible of the heat outside.

Roofs were flat so that during the summer nights it was possible to go and sleep on the roof in the cool air under the sky. The Gulf enjoys very little rainfall when compared to most other parts of the world, so there is not much need for angled roofs as in areas where heavy rains are common.

An integral part of islamic architecture is the use of geometric and symmetrical forms and the contrast between light and shadows. Since there is plenty of sunlight in this area, it is also important to provide as much shade as possible by means of architecture.

COOLING THE HOUSE

With houses built as they were, much of the heat of the sun was left outside, but in the hottest months, it would still been terribly warm inside. The answer to this problem was the 'badqeer', or wind tower.

These are tower sructures rising several meters above the house. They have large openings on all four sides for channeling down even the slightest breeze there is. If you stand under a wind tower on a hot summer day, you will notice a clear drop in the temperature as the air flows down.

Even today, despite the air-conditioning, one can find new buildings with wind towers. While the modern wind towers are not primarily built for cooling the air indoors, they still serve as important architectural elements reminding of the not so distant past.

EVERYONE WAS AN ARCHITECT

Houses were not planned much beforehand; instead they were expanded when necessary- again, a expanded diffrence with modern houses, which lack the more organic nature of their randomly built predecessors. Because of the use of local materials everyone knew what to do and how to do it; nowadays you need the skills of highly educated professionals who use hi-tech building materials.

... A good place to start your exploration is the fabulous Shaikh Isa bin Ali's house, the home of the great grandfather of the present Amir, HH Shaikh Isa bin Sulman Al Khalifa. It is one of the best surviving examples of traditional Bahraini architecture.

source: Mika Micheal

Manama

Exploring the Manama trading sector

Amazing Photography

Photo taken by: Peter Cook.